Fun and Games in Gulu

Malaria has been largely contained in urban Kampala.  While local residents still contract this mosquito-borne illness quite regularly, it usually comes about two weeks after they travel “up country.”  While I religiously take my daily dose of doxycycline when I am here, I don’t bother to coat myself in mosquito repellant every waking hour (like Joline does).  I don’t floss either.  A bite here and there in Kampala is little more than an itchy nuisance.

But when I venture out of Kampala, I break out the spray and vigilantly hunt down the little bat rastards before I turn out the hotel room light each night.

David and I unceremoniously escorted a few of them to the hereafter in our shared room in Gulu before turning in Friday night.  We had to rig our respective mosquito nets in order to avoid the nets touching our heads while we slept.  David outrigged me by a fair margin.  I couldn’t quite close the entire gap between the bottom of the net and the top of the one side of the bed, but figured it wouldn’t matter since I had added a second skin of “Off” to my muscular and toned frame.

So when I jolted awake at 4:30 a.m. to the unmistakable sound of mosquito wings dive bombing my Lincolnesque forehead, I was pissed.  I quickly figured out that the miniature Dracula had already hors d’oeuvred my left hand and right forehead.  Not wanting to turn on the light and wake David, I sprang into action, whipping my hands about my face and body in an attempt to send the offender into hiding onto the net somewhere.  I then lickety splitted the corners of the net together and twisted like a Chubby Checkers aficionado.  (Notwithstanding my earlier wishful musing, I already had the chubby part well in hand).  Since my net was now rendered useless, I compensated by emptying the rest of the bottle of Off onto myself and then mummifying all but my breathing holes.  No more bites that night.

After breakfast, Kelsey, David, and I waited patiently for our Ugandan counterparts to arrive from their hotel across town.  A few minutes after they should have picked us up, they called and reported that they couldn’t get the van going.  They had tried seven push-starts, but to no avail.  They informed us they were going to recruit some locals to give it one last try, and then cry uncle.  Ten minutes, and ten pushing Ugandans later, they were rolling.  David and I couldn’t help but marvel at our strength-of-five-Ugandans-each manhood.

From the hotel, we drove out to the Restore Leadership Academy to catch up with some old friends and to check out the construction progress.  As I have written about before, this secondary school was founded by Bob Goff and Restore International six or seven years ago to bring hope and a sterling education to a region devastated by Joseph Kony and the LRA.  This is also the school where Henry and Joseph enrolled after gaining their release from the Ihungu Remand Home thirty months ago.  After enduring several years of mindless bureaucracy, Restore finally secured clear title to a large chunk of land it had purchased outside of Gulu.  Construction is in full swing and it looks great.

Staff Housing and Boys' Dorms at Restore

Major Progress on the Guest House

“Second John,” as he is sometimes called because he succeeded John Niemeyer (aka “Two-Bunk John”) as Restore’s country director, gave us a tour of the place.  We also got to spend some time with Joseph, who begins his final year at Restore next week.

Joseph, Jim, Kirby, David, Joshua, and Daniel at Restore

It was gratifying to see where the new primary school will be built, which will enable Restore to serve all levels of education in Gulu.

From there, we drove to the Gulu Remand Home to meet with the warden and to tour the facility.  Though grossly underfunded and understaffed, the Remand Home’s warden is doing an excellent job of holding things together.  Likewise, the Resident Judge is doing his best to keep the kids moving through the system.  There is still plenty of work to do, but things are not falling apart like in a few other locations in Uganda.

Mural at Gulu Remand Home

We finished our work at the Remand Home at around 1:00 p.m., so we decided to sample the local cuisine before beginning the five-plus hour drive back to Kampala.  I ordered the goat, and immediately regretted it.  Rather than being in cube-shaped meat hunks on a bed of rice like goats naturally occur in the wild, mine was . . . well, different.  It was in a bowl, rather than on a plate, and while there were a few irregular-shaped meat hunks, they were still clinging to bone shards.  And they had some friends.  One of the friends looked remarkably like a digestive system.

“They are intestines,” (pronounced with a long second i) said Sarah.  “They are very nice.”

“They look like a science experiment.  I am not eating them,” I declared.

“Then I will.”  And she did.

The other friend of the meat-on-a-roof-of-the-mouth-piercing-bone-spear looked more like an octopus than anything else.

Goat "parts"

“What is this?” I asked the two Americans and four Ugandans at the table.

After a pregnant pause following six intent stares, Brian the prosecutor said, “It is [unintelligible Lugandan word].”

“Huh?”

After unsuccessfully searching for an unsurprisingly absent English translation, he said, “It is the part where dung is stored before it goes out.”

“Umm, the anus?” I asked.

“Yes, and the part before that.  “It doesn’t taste bad,” Brian replied.

“Umm, you know what goat anus tastes like?” I inquired.

Sarah, who had previously slurped down the intestines like they were gummy bears, said, “For me, I don’t eat that part.”

I guess everyone draws the line somewhere.

David had taken quite an intense interest in my anus, well not my anus, but the goat anus on my plate, and was turning it over with his fork and studying it.  “It looks like it has teeth,” he finally declared.  He was right.

I asked Kirby how much I would have to pay her to eat it.  She wisely responded that she wouldn’t eat it for a billion shillings.  And she wasn’t kidding.  I concurred.

But David seemed perplexed by our ingestion allergy to the south end of a northbound goat.  So Kirby and I offered him 20,000 shillings each (totaling $16).  His manhood now had a price, and he accepted the dare.  By this time, the attention of the entire restaurant had focused on our table.

We took some pictures and started the “Go, Go, Go” chant.  Just as he deposited the bung hole into his pie hole, I colorfully described the scenario in ways I shan’t repeat because my mother is reading this.  Realization must have finally hit David, because he sputtered and heaved a bit.

David holding it together . . . barely

In the end, he held it together and got it down, but not without nearly five minutes of chewing and chasing with anything he could find that didn’t resemble butt.

When we reached the halfway point on our journey back to Kampala, Sarah barked something to Daniel in Luganda.  He immediately pulled over at one of the many road-side markets.

“Why are we stopping, Daniel?”  David inquired.

“Sarah wants to buy some chickens,” Daniel responded.

“Wait, live chickens?”  David said.  “We can’t bring live chickens into van with us.”

“Yes, we can,” came the chorus.  David hasn’t been in Uganda long enough.

After ten minutes of haggling, we were on our way again . . . with four additional passengers – two roosters and two hens, tied at the ankles.

Roadside Transaction

The rest of the ride home passed uneventfully, with only an occasional note of protest from the new additions.

*          *          *

Sunday morning, I hired a car to take me to pick up Henry from his school for a long breakfast at the nearly-American Café Javas.  David met us there and we spent about four hours catching up with Henry.

When I dropped Henry back off at school, I had a chance to chat with his Physics teacher, who has become a good friend.  This turned into an impromptu Sunday lunch at his sister’s house.

Sunday lunch with teacher Jonathan's sister and niece

I took a quick nap, then headed to the airport.  As I finish this post, I am chilling in the Amsterdam lounge on a four-hour layover.  It has been a good trip, but I will be glad to be back with my family.  I recorded the Super Bowl and am staying off the internet so I can watch it “live” on Monday evening when I get home.  Go Niners.